Sir John Mortimer, author of the “Rumpole of the Bailey” series (and the “Tea With Mussolini” screenplay, among others), answers a meme question in Sunday’s NYT magazine.
…Three little pigs: We acquired the pigs last year. My wife was born on a pig farm and has always been very fond of pigs. Of course, they are for eating, which is why they are named Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner. You wouldn’t want to eat Rufus, Marcus and Esmeralda.
…Really annoying is the woman who, as soon as she takes her place on the dining couch, praises Vergil, excuses Dido’s suicide, compares and ranks in critical order the various poets, and weighs Vergil and Homer on a pair of scales. Grammar teachers surrender, professors of rhetoric are defeated, the entire group of guests is silent; neither a lawyer nor an auctioneer nor even another woman will get a word in. So loud and shrill are her words that you might think pots were being banged together and bells were being rung…
Like a philosopher she defines ethics. If she wants to appear so learned and eloquent, she should shorten her tunic to midcalf! . . . Don’t marry a woman who speaks like an orator – or knows every history book. There should be some things in books which she doesn’t understand. I hate a woman who reads and rereads Palaemon’s treatise on grammar, who always obeys all the laws and rules of correct speech, who quotes verses I’ve never even heard of, moldy old stuff that a man shouldn’t worry about anyway. Let her correct the grammer of her stupid girfriend!
A husband should be allowed an occasional “I ain’t.”
An early version of “Care for some cheese… …with that whine?”
And I did, too, until reminded by Dave’s post about St. Crispin’s Day. And I have to share why I have such fondness for Branagh’s “Henry the Fifth”. It’s not all the magnificence of a truly magnificent film.
In all of Orange County, it was only playing at a little art house theatre in Laguna Beach. I was desperate to see it and major dad thought we could hit their Saturday matinee with Ebola and be pretty safe. Getting there just as the theatre opened, we found seats we could isolate ourselves in and still see. We warned everyone who went to sit near us that “we’ve got a third-grader with us.” Almost to a one they all said “thanks for letting us know” and would move a row or two away. Except for one guy who, bless his heart, said “Really? That’s okay ~ I’d be curious to know what he thinks of it.” And he plopped down right in front of us.
This is no exaggeration ~ through the whole long thing, the one and ONLY time Ebola opened his mouth was as the French nobles were staging on the hill above the field. The English were done with “St. Crispin’s Day” speeches and scurrying through the cold and damp to their positions behind the barricades. As they stared at each other, Ebola whispered, “Mommy?”
“What honey?” I whispered back.
“Who are the bad guys?” he asked.
“The clean ones.”
“Okay.”
And that was it.
Magical.
Warning!
Shakespeare’s works contain references to adultery, incest, and premarital sex, and is replete with bawdy humor and double entendres. And don’t forget the violence. Don’t even get me started on the violence. Quick — name a Shakespearean tragedy where the title characters live through the fifth act. Couldn’t do it, could you? Bodies pile up faster in Shakespeare’s plays than they do in the Baltimore morgue.**
…“Detective Bart Lasiter was in his office studying the light from his one small window falling on his super burrito when the door swung open to reveal a woman whose body said you’ve had your last burrito for a while, whose face said angels did exist, and whose eyes said she could make you dig your own grave and lick the shovel clean,” Guigli wrote.
“The judges were impressed by his appalling powers of invention,” said Scott Rice, a professor in SJSU’s Department of English and Comparative Literature.
Grisham En Espanol? No Mas for Ga. Library
The library system in this suburban Atlanta county says no mas – it won’t buy any more thrillers, romance novels or other works of adult fiction in Spanish.
The decision has angered Hispanic leaders and thrust Gwinnett County – where one out of six residents is Hispanic – into the nation’s immigration debate.
Last week, the library board in this fast-growing county of 700,000 people eliminated the $3,000 that had been set aside to buy Spanish-language fiction in the coming fiscal year. It offered no explanation, but the chairman said such book purchases would lead readers of other foreign languages to demand the same treatment.
But, having said that, with the nickel and a half they do spend in an attempt to keep us marginally literate, English would be a good choice.
The spelling crown, I mean.
She was a cool customer. I could barely stand to watch ~ tension so thick you could cut it with a knife.
Bingley Update and bump: I live in Jersey, so this is great, but I’m sorry, the best part of this for me is that the Canadian Champwas knocked out by “weltschmerz”. That’s just too delicious.
Now, for My Proposal and it’s rules of engagement:
1) We are writing a draft screenplay called ‘Smoke on the Water:A Cambodian Christmas‘. (His life being so full of epic moments, I felt the prudent move is to limit it to just this one.)
2) Please keep your narrative/yarn to at most short paragraph. Pick up the action where the previous poster left off and contribute your own flights of fancy for this riveting saga.
3) Use all of your imagination. And as little foul language as possible, a challenge considering the subject matter. Decorative and artful cursing in the course of conversation between players is not expressly prohibited.
Pencils and legal pads at the ready? Grand!
Now have at it and remember, it’s a (Cambodian) jungle out there.
To get you in the mood, I’m including a link to John Kerry’s Bad Rap at no additional charge.
A new book about the Katrina catastrophe paints a portrait of New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin as a clueless, collapsing coward who hid out after the hurricane in a high-rise hotel – and had to be rousted out of Air Force One’s bathroom.
GAH-rrrowlllll! Brings my blood to a bawdy burble.
nugatory \NOO-guh-tor-ee\ adjective
1 : of little or no consequence : trifling, inconsequential
2 : having no force : inoperative
– NOU-gat : see:BINGLEY
snivel \SNIV-ul\ verb
1 a : to run at the nose b : snuffle
2 : to cry or whine with snuffling
3 : to speak or act in a whining, sniffling, tearful, or weakly emotional manner
IT was perhaps a little embarrassing to learn that the British producers of the latest “Pride and Prejudice” released a different ending for American audiences: a swoony moonlit scene of Elizabeth Bennet and Mr. Darcy in dishabille, kissing and cooing in a post-coital clinch.
It was as if NASA had prepared an international mission to Mars and felt a need to lace the Russians’ Tang with vodka.
Gasp and Grope ~ Austen, American-style. (I didn’t read where Mr. Bingley got any extra action, though. He must have been busy trolling online.) And I guess we’ve infected the homeland with more than just fast-food:
And Austen fans in England who got wind of the American version were incensed that they had been denied a final kiss.
“I turned to my friend during the movie and said, ‘I have always wanted to see my book on the big screen and there it is; I just didn’t get credit for it,’ ” said Mr. Turnipseed, who served as a truck driver with the Marine Corps for about 90 days in 1991.
I mean, how could you possibly screw over a Marine named Turnipseed? That’s just un-American.
catachresis \kat-uh-KREE-sis\ noun *1 : use of the wrong word for the context
2 : use of a forced and especially paradoxical figure of speech Example sentence: The paper printed a correction for the previous day’s catachresis: dubbing a local artist-philanthropist a “socialist” when they meant “socialite.”
I find myself calling Bingley a “fascist” when I meant to say “fathead”, so this has some relevance.
…However, this is not to say that the baby boomer’s children are without their own problems. Yes, we have learned from yesterday’s mistakes in areas like proper sun exposure and showing parental affection. But as a psychologist specializing in adolescents, I have seen the pendulum swing too far in the opposite direction with some current child raising fads.
…What I learned from Lileks’ interesting and entertaining book is that moderation is the key in child rearing and, sometimes, it is best to trust our own instincts. Experts are there to help but Lileks reminds us that they are human and make mistakes, too. Mommy Knows Worst is a great read for those who wonder if child rearing was always this hard. Apparently, the answer is “yes.”
The Cult of Self Esteem is our generation’s horrible fad that we are inflicting on our kids.
golden handcuffs \GOAL-dun-HAND-kuffs\ noun
: special benefits offered to an employee as an inducement to continue service Example sentence:
Ken eventually accepted the golden handcuffs and agreed to five more years with the goat.
Littrachure | tree hugging sister | 
March 12, 2007 11:38 am | 
Comments (3) 
…with that whine?”
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